We had a fun evening making up gratitude paragraphs about vases, kitchen utensils and suchlike. It had given me hope that nothing would change between us. I’d been happy.

However, now the guilt is getting to me, in giant waves.

These are the type of complex feelings I should bring up in therapy. Not sit there yacking away telling stories and divulging unrelated snippets of my life.

I pour the remainder of my champagne down the sink. The acid is burning the back of my throat. I hope I’m not coming down with a cold; I can’t afford to be ill. Maybe it’s the thwarted desire to speak to Camilla that’s causing the problem. I go upstairs and check on the children. I hesitate outside Stuart’s room. There’s no longer any point in searching for clues of potential fairy-tale, wicked stepmothers now that I’m here. I’m Nina’s stand-in, the best protector of Felix and Emily. Another woman on the scene could change my relationship with them or muddy the waters.

I go to my own room and shut the door firmly, as if the gesture itself will prevent me from any temptation to pry.

I sit on my bed and take out my journal. The words don’t come.

Instead, I take out Nina’s paperwork and rework through the figures, making careful notes. Nina was siphoning off and hiding money in dribs and drabs. A few hundred here and there, but all differing amounts. The main pattern is that she did it regularly, once a week usually, starting several years after she began earning money from her various small businesses.

Annoyance builds. I wish Nina had opened up to me. We had opportunities, not just toward the end, but before that. We went to church together once because she said she didn’t want to go alone. It wasn’t during a service—the place was empty. We sat in silence, near the front, for a good ten minutes in the cool darkness. Neither one of us had prayed since school, so we couldn’t bring ourselves to do it in front of one another. Silly, maybe, considering. Still, it was peaceful, until we were disturbed. The church door banged. Nina leaped up, as did I, but no one was there. It was odd, as we’d both heard footsteps.

“Do you believe in ghosts?”

“Yeah, headless ones running around with axes,” I laughed to ease the mood.

How could I have been so bloody insensitive? A horrible thought: what if she was waiting for me to ask her something, to push her? What if I was too stupid, too self-absorbed, to read the signs? I trawl through all our last moments, desperately trying to think, to grab hold of something relevant. She was deliberately vague, perhaps trying to tell me something without having to spell it out.

“Promises aren’t always easy to keep,” she said when she impressed upon me the importance of keeping mine.

“Not for me,” I assured her.

“I want people, especially the children, naturally, to remember me for who I am now, the person I became, not the self-centered one I was when I was younger.”